


green fingernails and purple skirts

by SoloChaos



Category: Bandom, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Gen, Gender Confusion, Genderfluid Character, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-29
Updated: 2014-07-29
Packaged: 2018-02-11 00:17:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2045727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoloChaos/pseuds/SoloChaos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Some of this was written a long time ago as an attempt to figure a few things out. Recently I was scrolling through and decided to finish. I hope I didn't offend anyone, but honestly, a lot of this was based off of personal experience, so please be gentle. </p><p>(The Josh Dun part, unfortunately, was not personal experience.)</p></blockquote>





	green fingernails and purple skirts

Tyler likes his body.

He likes his thin hips. He likes his muscled arms. He likes the stubble on his jaw.

But sometimes he watches Jenna, Maddy, Debby, any girl, and feels some strange emotion, almost like jealousy, and wonders why.

 

"Hey," Josh says, rapping his knuckles on the doorframe of Tyler's dressing room as he pokes his head in, "you all right?"

"Mm?" Tyler says, looking away from the mirror. "Oh, yeah. I'm fine."

Josh looks at him for a moment, then Tyler's reflection, and pats him on the back. "We're on in ten," he tells him before leaving.

"Okay," Tyler says to the now-empty room, and tries to shrug off the _wrongness_ he feels when he notes his boxer briefs as he pulls on his pants before shrugging on a floral print shirt.

 

Tyler can no longer walk past the ladies undergarments section of the store without feeling jealous.

Insanely, _stupidly_ jealous.

It kind of reminds him of the thing he read about amputees and ghost limbs, like they can feel it, but it's not there.

It's the most ridiculous thing, because Tyler's never had anything to begin with, but whenever he walks past that section he feels jealousy, jealousy of the women who can shop there. He feels it so acutely and it's driving him a little mad.

 

Jenna is made of long, blonde hair and smooth, tan legs and soft, gentle curves.

So he ends it with her.

He thinks that the moment a guy becomes jealous of his girlfriend's body is the moment that they should break up.

 

It was impulsive.

Tyler rubs his thumb over one of his fingernails, feeling the glossy smoothness. He holds a hand up, and the pale green polish glimmers in the light.

He gets odd looks from everyone except Josh, who simply glances at them and says, "I like that color."

 

Tyler feels buzzed, almost, as his arms grow more and more full of floral-print shirts and legging and even a few skirts, and it all comes crashing down when he sees the "surreptitious" glances from the employees and fellow shoppers.

Normally he doesn't care, but he usually has someone with him when he shops. Someone to give him confidence.

When he begins thumbing through the sizes of dresses, an employee comes up to him and asks, "Sir, do you need any help?" with a little too much emphasis on the "Sir".

He mumbles something about a girlfriend, shoves his entire pile of clothing into the employee's arms, and races out of the store.

 

There are genders other than male and female.

There are more than two genders.

Tyler knows this, but he never thought...

He's terrified.

 

"I just-" Tyler begins, pauses, sighing into the phone. "It's like, I- I like my body and I like being a guy, but sometimes I want to be a girl too. Just not all the time. And- and sometimes I want to wear skirts and dresses, but sometimes I really don't want to."

Gerard is silent on the other line for a moment before he says, "It sounds like you're genderfluid."

"Genderfluid?" Tyler echoes. He isn't unfamiliar to the concept of being genderfluid, but he still asks, "What does that mean?"

"It means that you transition back and forth between genders," Gerard explains.

"Oh," Tyler says. That- that really sounds like him, but he's just so _terrified._ "Maybe."

He runs his fingers through his hair. "But I- I want to wear skirts and stuff when I feel like a boy. I want to wear basketball shorts and things when I feel like a girl."

Gerard shrugs. "I want to wear skirts and stuff when I feel like a boy too," he tells Tyler. "And clothes aren't gender-specific. Are you a boy? Then you're wearing boy clothes. Are you a girl? Then you're wearing girl clothes. Are you genderqueer? Then you're wearing genderqueer clothes."

"...oh," Tyler says, feeling mildly overwhelmed. Gerard said that all very quickly.

"Yeah," Gerard says.

 

Later, as Tyler curls up in his bunk and thinks about everything Gerard had said, from genderfluidity to presentation to pronouns to dysphoria to surgery to oh hey have you tried those Reece's Oreos.

He's feeling so overwhelmed and he wants to tell someone, tell someone who he might be, he's not _sure,_ but he's _scared._

And... and he feels so crappy for being scared, but he _is,_ he so is, and he's not even sure what he's scared of. A new chapter to his life? Reevaluation of his life so far? Discrimination? Dysphoria?

Being different?

 

Tyler spends the next week or so curled up in his bunk whenever possible, eating chocolate bar after chocolate bar and having frequent bouts of "Oh gosh oh gosh what am I oh gosh."

For the first couple days he doesn't touch his phone, doesn't research like he maybe should. He's not sure if he wants to find people like he might be.

And he kind of feels like a bad person for that. He's scared, but it feels like he's insulting every genderqueer person by being so.

And he finally caves, starts to research, takes quizzes, reads personal stories.

 

"Josh, I'm- I'm..." Tyler takes a deep breath. "I'm genderfluid."

Josh looks at him for moment, before nodding and saying, "Okay."

"Okay?" Tyler repeats. "Just like that?"

Josh nods. "Just like that."

 

"So, um," Josh says later, sliding into Tyler's bunk, "what pronouns do you prefer?"

"Oh, uh," Tyler says. He honestly hasn't thought about this. He was too overwhelmed by everything Gerard was saying to even consider what pronouns he wanted. "I- I mean, I've been using masculine pronouns all my life. I'm not really sure what I want now."

Josh nods. "Let me know when you figure it out, yeah?"

"Okay," Tyler says. "Thank you."

"Of course," Josh says, squeezing his shoulder.

 

"It depends," Tyler says a few days later as he clambers into Josh's bunk.

There's no context, but Josh instantly knows.

"What does it depend on?" Josh asks.

Tyler shrugs. "How I'm feeling," he says. "Usually when I'm dressed like a stereotypical guy I want feminine pronouns, and when I'm dressed as a stereotypical girl I want masculine pronouns, but that's not always the case."

"Can you tell me what you're feeling when you're feeling it?" Josh asks. "I don't want to misgender you."

Tyler smiles. "Yeah, of course," he says. "Thank you."

 

About a week later, Josh hands her a little box.

"You don't have to wear it if you don't want to," Josh says, blushing a little. "But I just thought it might help not being misgendered."

Curious, Tyler opens the box to see a chain with two charms attached. She looks closely at the charms to see one with "he/him" engraved, and the other with "she/her" engraved.

Tyler nearly bursts into tears.

Instead, she smiles as wide as she can at Josh, flips the necklace so it reads "she/her", and slips it on.

 

The crew is understandably confused by the necklace, and the way Josh switches pronouns, but they don't ask, and a few of them even go along with what the necklace says.

It's probably confusing to see him in a floral shirt with his necklace flipped to "he/him" and the next day see her in a sports jersey with the necklace reading "she/her".

But they're trying, they really are, and sometimes Tyler feels like standing on top of the world.

 

"Josh, would you mind if I, uh, woreaskirtonstage?" Tyler blurts out.

"What?" Josh asks.

"Um. Wore- wore a skirt," Tyler says, blushing. "Onstage."

"Tyler," Josh says, taking both his hands in his own, "you can wear whatever you want as long as you don't get arrested."

Tyler smiles shyly, and Josh hugs him tightly.

"Whatever you want, Tyler," Josh whispers.

 

"Whoa," Mark says when Tyler walks out of the dressing room. "You're actually wearing that?"

Tyler looks down at the long, flowing skirt someone threw onto the stage a while ago.

"Yeah," he says. "What's wrong with it?"

Mark stares at him for one long moment before shrugging. "Nothing," he says.

"Hey," Josh says, walking up and placing a hand on the small of Tyler's back. "Ready?"

Tyler nods. Josh gives him a hug and whispers, "We're gonna be sick," into his ear.

 

Tyler's fairly certain that his skeleton hoodie doesn't match his bright purple skirt, but he doesn't care. The skirt swishes around his legs, billows out when he jumps, and he feels _pretty._

Also, his skirt goes amazingly well with his light gray shirt.

He's purposely not looking at the people in the crowd's faces. He's noticed that the amount of flashes from the cameras seems greater, and that the crowd seems a little more muted, but other than that, everything seems to be going as usual.

He looks back at Josh once both their masks are off and grins. Josh beams back.

Tyler loves Josh. He _loves_ him. He's not certain about himself right now, and he's not sure if he'll ever be, but he's certain he loves Josh. Josh who bought him a pronoun necklace and calls him by whatever the tags tell him to. Josh who hugs him and asks him questions and is so, so respectful and understanding. Josh who will treat him like a lady if Tyler wants him to.

Josh is in for the long run, and Tyler loves him.

**Author's Note:**

> Some of this was written a long time ago as an attempt to figure a few things out. Recently I was scrolling through and decided to finish. I hope I didn't offend anyone, but honestly, a lot of this was based off of personal experience, so please be gentle. 
> 
> (The Josh Dun part, unfortunately, was not personal experience.)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [When the Seasons Change, Will You Stand by Me?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2089881) by [aintitfun](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aintitfun/pseuds/aintitfun)




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